31
Oct

Mina Harker's Journal

31 October - Later

Dr. Van Helsing has
returned. He has got the carriage and horses. We are to have some dinner, and
to start in an hour. The landlady is putting us up a huge basket of provisions.
It seems enough for a company of soldiers. The Professor encourages her, and whispers
to me that it may be a week before we can get any food again. He has been shopping
too, and has sent home such a wonderful lot of fur coats and wraps, and all sorts
of warm things. There will not be any chance of our being cold.

We shall
soon be off. I am afraid to think what may happen to us. We are truly in the hands
of God. He alone knows what may be, and I pray Him, with all the strength of my
sad and humble soul, that He will watch over my beloved husband. That whatever
may happen, Jonathan may know that I loved him and honoured him more than I can
say, and that my latest and truest thought will be always for him.

Arrived
at Veresti at noon. The Professor tells me that this morning at dawn he could
hardly hypnotize me at all, and that all I could say was, "dark and quiet."
He is off now buying a carriage and horses. He says that he will later on try
to buy additional horses, so that we may be able to change them on the way. We
have something more than 70 miles before us. The country is lovely, and most interesting.

If only we were under different conditions, how delightful it would be
to see it all. If Jonathan and I were driving through it alone what a pleasure
it would be. To stop and see people, and learn something of their life, and to
fill our minds and memories with all the colour and picturesqueness of the whole
wild, beautiful country and the quaint people! But, alas!